Why I love Nepal

Birthe Krabek14. november 2017

In Nepal in Kathmandu, me and my husband stayed at a very nice place. Every day we had a good talk with our host and his family. Many tourists dream of being inside a family, very close to the daily life. We had this luck.

So our host Suraj took us to many places and showed us around in Kathmandu and when we had to go Chitwan and there were no flight or bus, he took his Tata car and drove us to that place.

We often had a cup of tea with pepper together in the living room and there we discussed and talked about lot of things. The daily life in Denmark compared with Nepal. The politics here and there. The school system here and there. How to get more aware of the resources we all have and so on. I loved these moments. Cultural exchange. More input for optimizing the mindset.

One day Suraj told us about the preschool where the son Tin Tin was a student. It was a school build on the principles of Montessori based on self – directed activity, hands on learning and collaborative play. We were happy to hear about the school and immediately Suraj arranged a visit.

As a former head in the danish free school system I was very interested in this visit in the heart of Kathmandu.

Poonam Dhungel, the head of the school welcomed us and she told us about how she made this school without any financial support from the state or anywhere else. She manage to run the school only by the payment from the parents.

The school was decorated with the children´s creative productions and many slogans showing the values of the school.

We had the feeling that this school appreciated the children and met them in their diversity.

The school system in Nepal is among the youngest in the world. In the 1950th the government established the national system of education realizing the need of developing a democratic mindset. In 1959 the first university opened in Tribhuan.
The commission report from 1956 is excellent reading. It is honest, visionary and embraces all kind of needs in the educational system. I would love if the danish programs would look like this report.